Town News Briefing

February 07, 2004

REGION 4

Expected Overrun Halts

Some School Spending

DEEP RIVER -- An expected overrun in the special education account for Regional District 4 has led school officials to freeze spending on some supplies, equipment and textbooks at Valley Regional High School and John Winthrop Junior High School.

Superintendent John Gillespie said the overexpenditure could exceed $100,000 by the close of the budget year on June 30. He said it is a result of a higher than expected number of special education students at the two schools and a reduction in state reimbursements for special education and related transportation expenes. Some of the approximately six additional special-education students must be driven to out-of-district programs.

Gillespie said the overrun would be covered within the total $12.36 million district education budget and is not expected to require approval of an additional appropriation by voters of the district towns of Chester, Deep River, and Essex.

Along with curtailment of certain expenditures, several unexpected teacher retirements over the past year are also expected to generate savings that could be transferred to cover special education expenses.

OLD LYME

Garden Club Offers

Scholarships To Seniors

OLD LYME -- The Duck River Garden Club of Old Lyme annually offers scholarships to Lyme-Old Lyme High School graduating seniors. Lyme-Old Lyme seniors who attend private schools are also eligible for the scholarships.

The club raises money for scholarships through its annual plant sale in May. The club also provides civic beautification through the town, planting and maintaining flowers at the town hall, the post office, the town green, the police and fire stations and at several new planters strategically located in town. Throughout the year, a member of the club makes a floral arrangement for the library.

To be eligible for the scholarship of up to $1,000 an applicant should demonstrate an interest in pursuing one of the following fields or related fields of study: horticulture, botany, agriculture, environmental science, landscape design, ecology, forestry and parks or outdoor recreation.

Applications may be obtained from the Lyme-Old Lyme High School guidance office and should be submitted by April 1.

PORTLAND

Worker's 30-Foot Fall

Under Investigation

PORTLAND -- Investigators said Friday that they were trying to determine what caused a worker to fall 30 feet from the top of a building under construction on Grove Street a day earlier.

Police identified the worker as Doug Charette, an employee of Advanced Welding. Charette's age and hometown were unavailable.

Charette was working atop a steel beam at Portland Boat Works when he apparently slipped and tumbled onto a motorized crane before landing on the ground, police said.

Charette suffered a broken leg, severe head cuts and internal injuries, authorities said. He was in stable condition Friday at Hartford Hospital.

MIDDLETOWN

Adath Israel Offers

Genealogy Course

MIDDLETOWN -- As part of the adult education program for the 100th anniversary of Congregation Adath Israel, a training class is being offered for tracing Jewish genealogy using computers.

The program will be at 10 a.m. Feb. 29 at the science center, Room 523, at Wesleyan University.

For more information, call Ilene Daling at 860-346-4709.

AREAWIDE

Chamber Schedules

Legislative Breakfast

The Middlesex County Chamber of Commerce will hold its annual legislative breakfast at 8:30 a.m. Friday at the Radisson Hotel & Conference Center in Cromwell.

The legislative committee has completed its agenda for the 2004 legislative session and will present the issues to the region's legislators at the breakfast. Each legislator will receive a copy of the chamber's legislative agenda and will be given an opportunity for a brief opening statement. A question-and-answer session will follow.

Members of the chamber's board of directors and legislative committee have been invited to attend.

For more information about the breakfast or to learn more about the chamber's stance on legislative issues, call Kevin Marotta at the chamber at 860-347-6924 or e-mail kmarotta@middlesexchamber.

com.

AREAWIDE

DAR Chapter Plans

Meeting Tuesday

The Wadsworth chapter of Daughters of the American Revolution will meet at noon Tuesday at Covenant Village in Cromwell. The chapter's project will be Valentines for Veterans.

Eligible women interested in joining the DAR can call Evelyn Pasturnak at 860-267-2019 or Maria D'Ambrose at 860-347-5188.

BRISTOL

Lawmakers Host Show

About Rowland

BRISTOL -- Reps. Roger Michele, D-Bristol, and Demetrios Giannaros, D-Farmington, will host a special installment of Michele's weekly television show on Nutmeg TV devoted exclusively to the scandals involving Gov. John G. Rowland.

The show will air live on Monday from 7:30 to 8:30 p.m. on Channel 5. Michele said people can call in and either voice their opinion about the Rowland administration or ask questions about what is going on. People who want to participate should call 860-793-2180.

Called ``Bristol's Warrants,'' the show is generally devoted to area residents who have warrants for their arrest. Michele reads the names and charges of each person highlighted in the show, with off-the-cuff comments about some of them.

Michele said he wanted to devote a show to the Rowland issues because of the interest his constituents have shown.

In addition to being aired live on Monday, Nutmeg TV will broadcast the taped program again on Feb. 16.